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Introducing Japanese Knife Society

For quite some time now, we have been working in the background to try to make some educational knife skills videos for people trying to learn how to use Japanese knives. We have teamed up with Tatsuya Aoki and Mitsunori Ueda to produce these videos and finally have a few that are ready for you. We will be adding in English notes or voiceovers to these videos as they are produced to make the skill sets more accessible to you.

If you have questions about specific knives, techniques, skills, etc., please don’t hesitate to ask. We will do our best to respond to these requests with videos and/or detailed explanations.

Anyways, without any further delay, allow me to introduce Japanese Knife Society.

Can you use Japanese knives?
Japanese knives, or Wa-bocho, have been increasing in popularity over the past few years. Wa-bocho are some of the sharpest knives in the world, however, there are so few professional chefs outside of Japan that understand the knives’ potential and how to properly use them.

Japanese Knife Society (JKS) is an educationally oriented society. Working through the skill and experience of Chef Mitsunori Ueda, JKS aims to teach people about the different styles of Wa-bocho, how to use them, how to care for them, and what makes them special.

JKS hopes to positively contribute to the education of aspiring chefs, experienced chefs, and interested home cooks alike, through educational literature, pictures, blogs, videos, and events. Through JKS gears its educational material towards working chefs, it will be assessable to anyone with an interest in learning about Wa-bocho.

And now some videos:

First up, Ueda-san demonstrates how to break down Fugu (the type of fugu in this video is torafugu):

Here, Ueda-san shows how to use a Kamagata usuba to cut long onions (and chives for that matter):

And, in this last video, Ueda-san covers some of the basics of katsuramuki, using a cucumber and yanagiba (he used a yanagiba despite the fact that the proper knife is an usuba or kamagata usuba... he explained that often times sushi chefs do this as a matter of convenience and he was just concerned with demonstrating the proper techniques here... he will do another video covering the same with an usuba):

some people have asked about the fugu video... the fish is still moving after the first cut. But what you dont see is that the fish's spine has been severed and the fish is long since dead. The movements are all post mortum nerve twitches.

When he pulls the fish out of the tank, he severs the connection between the spine and the brain with his knife and also opens up the major arteries... the fish's heart continues to pump, helping to remove all of the blood from the body (the blood should not be eaten). Once all of that is done, then the fish is cut up (thats where this video begins).